Rajkumar Hirani, with his perfect score of movie hits, enters the streaming space with Pritam Aur Pedro, starring his son Vir Hirani, and Arshad Warsi (Circuit of his Munnabhai films). He has co-written the six-part show (on JioHotstar), but not directed it leaving that duty to Avinash Arun Dhaware.
When other crime shows on streaming platforms are slick and fast-paced, this one is almost old-fashioned, depending more on the chalk-and-cheese friendship between the two protagonists, rather than car chases or shootouts.
Set in picturesque Goa, the series has Warsi playing Pedro, an Luddite cop, who believes in boots on the ground policing. When he inadvertently offends minister (Satyadeep Mishra), he is given a “punishment” posting, with a transfer to the cyber cell. His ignorance makes him the laughing stock of the others in the team, clacking away on keyboards.
Luckily, he happened to encounter tech genius Pritam (Hirani), who, for some reason, is a vacuum cleaner salesman, even though his hacking skills are next level. Pedro asks for his help when the same minister’s son gets kidnapped. There is immense pressure to get the kid back alive, even though the father and wailing mother (Shruti Marathe) are willing to pay the ransom.
When Pritam with his computer skills and Pedro with his ability to join the dots, come close to tracing the criminal, they find he is one step ahead of them. The heart of Pritam Aur Pedro rests on the dynamic between the two unlikely allies, so, once their differences are established and their bickering out of the way, the show loses steam.
The slow one-step-after-another trudge to identify the invisible mastermind and prevent a tragedy gets mired in too many far-fetched procedural details. The humour peters out as the tension builds up, and the stakes get higher because the grey-shaded antagonist Martin (Vikrant Massey) has his own agenda.
The tragic backstories of two men, both involving cybercrime, could have been dispensed with, though they offer brief and sympathetic guest performances by Boman Irani and Mona Singh. (Inevitably Sanjay Dutt, another member of the Hirani universe makes a special appearance too).
Penned by Rajkumar Hirani, Abhijat Joshi, and Suyash Trivedi, based on the books by cyber consultant Amit Dubey, the plot ties itself up in too many knots and is rendered watchable by the performances of the two leads and some of the supporting cast, like Pedro’s assistants and the minister’s staff.
What the show points out are the dangers of the cyber world, which throws up worse threats every day, attacking the vulnerable, especially children.
Pritam And Pedro
Directed by Avinash Arun
Cast: Arshad Warsi, Veer Hirani, Vikrant Massey, Mona Singh and others
On JioHotstar